New Year, Same Me

Athena Dixon on setting intentions instead of making resolutions

“What are your resolutions?” my co-worker asks me as we’re settling in for the workday. It’s that blur of a week between Christmas and the new year. Half of the office is still out and the skeleton crew of us are tired and dragging. We’re federal employees and this year has been our own special hell, but we’ve made it by hook or by crook. The office is quiet, not in just the way that says the year is almost over, but also in the way that tells you people are deep into their thoughts about what the coming year will bring. I’m not much for talking. I just want to keep my headphones in and tap away at my keyboard until I glance at the time and the day has wrapped up. I can’t eat another cookie or candy cane and I’m tired of the red glitter that pops up on my desk from the decorations lining my cubicle.

“I don’t really make them,” I tell her while waiting for my computer to boot up. “I set my intentions. I made my jar this weekend.”

And I had. Sitting cross-legged on my bed, I’d read the note I wrote myself as last year closed and reflected on how much of it had come true. I’d taken a few moments to look at each trinket in the jar before I started to sift through them to determine which were important to include for 2026 and which had served their purpose. After those decisions were made, I said a few words over the old items and the new and sealed them into the jar before placing it back on the shelf in my office. When next December rolls around, I’ll repeat the ritual and keep my life pushing forward. I don’t journal much anymore, but this is the way I mark the passage of time and what it entails—my hopes, dreams, accomplishments, and my fears.

I’ve learned that giving myself grace means setting intentions instead of resolutions. For me, resolutions are promises that I rarely keep. And those failures tend to set a bitter tone over what I actually do as the year runs its course. Intentions are guidelines. They are what I want to do instead of what I am forcing myself to do for fear of failure.

I do my best to keep myself above the judgments of February when people have stopped going to the gym, had the forbidden soda, or taken a puff of nicotine, and progress gets put off until next year because it’s not perfect. Setting intentions means I’ve built in the possibility I may stumble. I may fall flat on my face. But I may also wildly succeed.

Eschewing resolutions means that all progress is good progress because I’m moving toward something new with purpose. On those occasions that something fails, I’m still travelling forward because now I know what works and what doesn’t. I can make a game plan to avoid the same mistakes and pitfalls the next time I start working on that goal. Intentions are kinder, softer. They don’t seem to include the pressure of having to make the world new again. They only ask me to shift a few things around and see how I like the arrangement. The intentions I set more gently prod me into resting or striving or standing still instead of wiping the slate clean and having to race toward December to prove that I’m accomplished and worthy.

To help guide myself to the best start to the new year, I’ve spent a good amount of time coming up with questions to ask myself when gathering my thoughts about where I see myself going and what I wish to experience. Not all of my thoughts are groundbreaking. Some of them are rooted in very real life changes and others are simply things that I think would make me happy no matter how fleeting. I don’t categorize my intentions, either. Just like the trinkets packed into the jar, everything goes into the same place because life is full of overlaps and new connections. What is important to me is to find at least a mix of the serious and the silly. The creative and the practical. I think about the start of each year like this:

1.) What are my goals, but more importantly, what do I want to feel as I’m working toward them? I don’t just focus on the outcome because I know I’m guilty of only caring about the bigger picture and tend to race through the experience in order to mark something off a list. My intentions are meant to make me appreciate the small steps that make up the larger journey.

I do my best to include items in my jar, and on the physical list I write, that represent these ideas. This year I want to get a new tattoo and a piercing. I want to become more fluent in Spanish. But I also want to pay off my car and increase my savings.

There are 10 intentions on my written list and about triple the amount of trinkets in the jar. Each of these ideas hits a particular part of my life I think needs attention. So if the year ends and my car loan still exists? I’m not going to be disappointed because the root of what I want to feel still remains the same. I want to feel responsible and accomplished. If I don’t pay it off, at least I’ve made extra payments and I’m still ahead. And if I still stumble when speaking Spanish? It’s fine because at least now I’m saying the words aloud instead of only reading them on the page.

2.) I ask myself if the intentions and goals I’m setting are mine or am I working toward change that I feel I’m obligated to reach because of tradition or social expectation? I don’t care about making a resolution to lose weight. I’m a big woman by both genetics and habits. My intention is to cut back on my soda consumption. If I lose weight? Great! That’s a bonus. I don’t want to be among the hordes of people who feel the new year means they have to rush to the gym because there is a finite amount of time to prove they’re serious about their body and that clock runs out on 12/31/2026.

I want to set intentions that make sense for my current life and that just as much as they involve change, they don’t require me to be a completely different person just because time has elapsed. I pay close attention to one key thing when I set these intentions. I like who I am and the only thing I should focus on is being a better version of her and not a completely new woman because the calendar has flipped.

3.) I ask myself what kind of fun I want to have in the months between then and now. There are always ideas popping into my head about what sounds like a good time. I buy tickets to all kinds of concerts and events. I show up at restaurant weeks and dinner parties. And yes, sometimes I get a little too ambitious in those plans and end up giving up the tickets or staying home, but remember I said all progress is good progress. I do attend events and I do have fun. The intention is to get out of the house and live some beautiful memories. I can do that a day at a time with or without a full calendar.

4.) Lastly, I set my intentions with lots of audacious hope. Some of the words I speak over the trinkets in the jar, and those on the list, can seem impossible without intervention from the universe or a miracle. But what’s the saying? Shoot for the moon and even if you fail you’ll end up among the stars? That’s the crux of all of my intentions, progress and forward movement, but why not dare to dream a little big while you’re working on the practical, too?

Athena Dixon is the author of essay collections The Incredible Shrinking Woman and The Loneliness Files and her work appears in publications such as Harper’s Bazaar, Shenandoah, Grub Street, Narratively, and Lit Hub among others. She is a Consulting Editor for Fourth Genre and the Nonfiction/Hybrid Editor for Split/Lip Press.